Simons: Chamber needs to take leadership role in push for downtown arena

This week, the leaders of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce asked to meet with the Edmonton Journal editorial board. Their message was simple.

They’re worried that Edmonton’s proposed new downtown hockey arena and concert venue is at risk, especially if a deal isn’t made quickly. And they want Edmontonians to know they support the project.

“Our voice is the voice of business for Edmonton,” said board chairman Ken Barry. “Now is the time to move this forward.”

What prompted this sudden public concern?

No one from the chamber would say. Reading between the lines, it appears the chamber was spooked by the provincial government’s recent quarterly update, which showed the Redford government in the red, and thus, one might assume, less inclined than ever to help make up the $100-million shortfall that’s still holding up the arena deal.

So is the chamber exercising its political clout to call on Redford to fund the arena, deficit or no deficit?

Nope.

Is the chamber lobbying the federal Conservatives for support?

No.

Ken Barry did vaguely suggest that the arena should be counted as regional infrastructure, something that will benefit municipalities all around Edmonton. But no, you guessed it: the chamber isn’t going on a limb and calling on the Capital Region board to back the arena, either.

Nor is it calling on its members to consider investing in the arena — or in the proposed hospitality zone that is supposed to surround the facility.

The chamber says it doesn’t want to comment publicly on any of those issues because they’re politically sensitive.

And there, folks, is a microcosm of exactly what’s wrong with the way this entire arena project has been conceived and sold to the public.

The chamber is firmly convinced, it says, that a new hockey rink-cum-concert hall is essential to downtown redevelopment, to enticing investment capital and international conventions to central Edmonton, to making it easier for local businesses to recruit and retain staff. Its members and board, however, are unwilling to expend any political or economic capital to help clinch the deal.

If city business leaders won’t offer practical and moral support for this project, why should the rest of us be convinced that it matters or that we should foot even more of the bill?

The chamber likes to position itself as a voice of fiscal conservatism and free enterprise in our community. In fact, its tepid support for the arena project smacks of crony capitalism at its most basic. Chamber members are, in effect, asking taxpayers for a public subsidy to support their private businesses. Yet they don’t even have the courage to come out and ask for it directly.

Ken Barry and his chamber colleagues are quite right when they point out construction costs are escalating, and that the faster we build the arena, the cheaper it will likely be. They are also right when they call on the city and the Katz Group not to cheap out on the deal, not to cut corners and build a dull, grey box. Their words would be more credible if they were willing to take a public position about just how they think this arena should really be funded or if the businesses they represent were willing to come to the table.

Perhaps Katz, the quintessential loner, doesn’t actually want a private-sector partner to share the risk, the costs, and the profits of his new arena.

But presumably there is private capital out there that might be interested in investing in a hotel or condo or retail development in the proposed entertainment district, something that would make the whole deal seem more plausible and viable.

In February, the Katz Group announced a deal with Edmonton-based WAM Development Group to develop the land around the arena.

Since then, however, the local business community has been markedly quiet. There are plans for a new hotel in the downtown core, to be sure. But that Prem. Singhmar project, which broke ground earlier this summer, is planned for Jasper Avenue in the Quarters, nowhere near the proposed rink.

If Edmonton’s business leaders truly believe in the value of a new downtown arena, not just to their collective bottom lines, but to the long-term prosperity of our city, they should stop complaining about the pace of the development and start leading. Until they find the courage of their convictions, they’re certainly not going to convince anyone else.

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Simons: Chamber needs to take leadership role in push for downtown arena

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